A. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of chemistry and particularly to the field of producing molecules in excited states, such as singlet molecular oxygen, 0.sub.2 (.sup.1 .DELTA..sub.g).
B. Description of the Prior Art
Molecules such as 0.sub.2 can exist in different energy states depending upon the arrangement of the electrons about the nucleus. The molecule is in an excited state when it is in an energy state above its usual ground state. One of the excited states for the oxygen molecule is the singlet molecular oxygen state generally identified by the symbol 0.sub.2 (.sup.1 .DELTA..sub.g) or by the abbreviation 0.sub.2 *. This molecule has practical utility because it has 1.0 ev of energy above the normal ground state, and thus can serve as a source of pumping energy in a chemical laser or as a synthesizing reagent for making organic compounds.
The generally used method of producing singlet molecular oxygen is via a microwave discharge in oxygen. Unfortunately, this technique produces low concentrations of singlet molecular oxygen (in the range of 1 to 10%), and the partial pressure of the singlet molecular oxygen is rather low (being less than 175 mtorr).
The chemical generation of 0.sub.2 * has been used where the 0.sub.2 * is both generated and used in solutions. Such prior technique requires aqueous H.sub.2 0.sub.2, a base such as NaOH, and a halogen or hypohalite salt such as Ca(0Cl).sub.2. Such method is not suitable for the gas phase generation of 0.sub.2 * for two principal reasons. First, the yields are low and are in the range realized by the microwave discharge technique. The second inadequacy lies in the nature of the reagents. Because the reaction is between a solid and a liquid, efficient mixing, feed control, and reaction control are difficult to obtain. Until the present invention, no method for chemically generating 0.sub.2 * was known which yields an acceptably high amount of 0.sub.2 * or which can be scaled up to provide practical quantities of 0.sub.2 *.